RNC “Fumbles” Sotomayor Talking Points?

According to The Hill’s Blog, the Republican National Committee has already screwed up their opposition to Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination:

Whoops. The Republican National Committee (RNC) has apparently inadvertently released its list of talking points on the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court.

Included on the released list were a few hundred influential Republicans who were the intended recipients of the talking points. Unfortunately for the RNC, so were members of the media.

Yikes! Sounds bad doesn’t it? There must be some mention of Sotomayor being an “especially dangerous” candidate because of her Hispanic ethnicity or something. Well, let’s have a look-see:

o President Obama’s nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court is an important decision that will have an impact on the United States long after his administration.

o Republicans are committed to a fair confirmation process and will reserve judgment until more is known about Judge Sotomayor’s legal views, judicial record and qualifications.

o Until we have a full view of the facts and comprehensive understanding of Judge Sotomayor’s record, Republicans will avoid partisanship and knee-jerk judgments – which is in stark contrast to how the Democrats responded to the Judge Roberts and Alito nominations.

o To be clear, Republicans do not view this nomination without concern. Judge Sotomayor has received praise and high ratings from liberal special interest groups. Judge Sotomayor has also said that policy is made on the U.S. Court of Appeals.

o Republicans believe that the confirmation process is the most responsible way to learn more about her views on a number of important issues.

o The confirmation process will help Republicans, and all Americans, understand more about judge Sotomayor’s thoughts on the importance of the Supreme Court’s fidelity to the Constitution and the rule of law.

o Republicans are the minority party, but our belief that judges should interpret rather than make law is shared by a majority of Americans.

o Republicans look forward to learning more about Judge Sotomayor’s legal views and to determining whether her views reflect the values of mainstream America.

Wow. That’s devastating. Republicans want a “fair confirmation process” devoid of “knee-jerk judgments” so that they can take the time to study Sotomayor’s record. Actually that sounds about right. Maybe this is one of those communiques that require a special liberal decoder ring to reveal the “code words” and their obviously racists message.

Pressing on with points about Obama’s motivations in picking a nominee:

o Liberal ideology, not legal qualification, is likely to guide the president’s choice of judicial nominees.

o Obama has said his criterion for nominating judges would be their “heart” and “empathy.”

o Obama said he believes Supreme Court justices should understand the Court’s role “to protect people who may be vulnerable in the political process.”

o Obama has declared: “We need somebody who’s got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it’s like to be a young teenage mom, the empathy to understand what it’s like to be poor or African-American or gay or disabled or old-and that’s the criterion by which I’ll be selecting my judges.”

For sure, quoting the President in your talking points is a sneaky way to get around the racist message that must be lurking in there … I sure could use that decoder ring.

Further points:

o Justice Souter’s retirement could move the Court to the left and provide a critical fifth vote for:

o Further eroding the rights of the unborn and property owners;

o Imposing a federal constitutional right to same-sex marriage;

o Stripping “under God” out of the Pledge of Allegiance and completely secularizing the public square;

o Abolishing the death penalty;

o Judicial micromanagement of the government’s war powers.

Ummm … so that’s it? Talking points that reiterate what the GOP has been saying for years? I’m missing where the RNC “fumbled” anything. Instead, it looks like The Hill got pwned.

The last set of ‘points’ are invalid — they are political, saying that the result of her decisions might lead to rulings that Republicans don’t like. The first set of points are valid in some cases, though using the word ‘policy’ is another silly cherry picking of a word from a quote, and whether or not she is ranked high by liberal groups is irrelevant. The second group of points doesn’t seem too valid — there is nothing wrong with empathy or concern about real human situations — again, otherwise we’d have a legal computer.